Sally McSpadden

Look what they’ve done

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By John Lyle Belden

It could be said that Cryptid Entertainment makes musicals for those who hate musicals, or rather, for those who don’t care for Broadway fare with the airs and prestige of classical opera. Building an enviable audience, Dakota Jones and company have given us weird stuff that he has written, then weird stuff that others originally made, much to the delight of Indy’s weirdos (including us).

But perhaps Mr. Jones has been running a long, long grift. Now he brings to the IF Theatre stage a bona fide Off-Broadway and ON Broadway hit, John Cameron Mitchell’s “Hedwig and the Angry Inch” (songs by Stephen Trask). To be fair, though, this Glam-Punk Post-Cold War masterpiece is right in the Cryptid wheelhouse. Let’s open the wig box and have a look.

Having to take what she can get, the IF is allowing “internationally ignored” genderqueer singer Hedwig Robinson to set up in what is apparently a punk-themed art show. She is backed by her band The Angry Inch and her current husband, Yitzhak, a former drag queen from the former Yugoslavia. During her set, she explains her background, growing up on the wrong side of the Berlin Wall; her botched sex change (the “inch”); and her life in America and relationship with rock star Tommy Gnosis – who is performing a sold-out concert down the street. Doing the math would have this taking place around the year 2000, but as rock ‘n’ roll is timeless, don’t sweat the details.

With direction and fierce costuming by Marina Eisenbraun, Hedwig is portrayed by Job Willman, also known as Ilana a la Mode. The performance brings on all the sass, spirit and sadness the role demands, and then some. Jess Hackenberg is Yitzhak, a deep well of resentment tempered with grudging love for the person who brought him out of his disintegrating homeland – obviously wishing (without saying it aloud) that he could perform as his true self once more. As Hedwig frequently interacts with the audience, Cryptid’s production has the thinnest fourth wall we have seen for this particular show. Willman’s drag queen experience likely aids their comfort with the fans, while seating is set all the way up and around the raised stage.

The onstage band (as The Angry Inch) is led by Jill Stewart (keyboard and guitar) with Chris Ritchie (bass), Kristin Cutler (drums), Sally McSpadden Hanna (guitar), Ainsley Paton (bass), and Ben Hogan (guitar). They rock!

Expressing philosophy that hearkens to Plato with the attitude of Pussy Riot, this show transcends its pretense of a concert or definition as a musical to be an incredible sensual experience, fueled by bitter comedy, a driving beat, and the search for both identity and a soul’s “other half.”

As has been the rule lately with Cryptid shows, tickets are going fast and sellouts are likely, “whether you like it or not.” “Hedwig” runs through May 31 on the Basile main stage of IF, 719 E. St. Clair St., Indianapolis. Tickets at indyfringe.org.

SSS Eclipse ‘Lizzie’ a riotous spectacle

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By John Lyle Belden

The Summer Stock Stage Eclipse program (professional, with collegiate performers) presents “Lizzie,” the new musical by Alan Stevens Hewitt and Steven Cheslik-deMeyer, book by Tim Maner, based on the Lizzie Borden legend, presented internationally since its introduction in 2010.

To clarify “musical,” this show is a Riot Grrl-style Punk Rock Opera – modify expectations accordingly and hold on for the ride.* To ask why it’s in this mode is to miss the cultural mystique of Miss Borden. She was already an outsider – unmarried at 30, still living with her controlling father and detested stepmother – when the gruesome events of August 1892 occurred in Fall River, Mass.

“Lizzie Borden took an ax, gave her mother forty whacks; when she saw what she had done, gave her father forty-one!”

Being rich from their penny-pinching parents, Lizzie and sister Emma hired the best possible representation, and with an all-male jury actually working in their favor, got her acquitted at trial. However, historians and even her fandom are fairly certain she did the deed. Still, this is not just a play about getting away with murder.

The story is presented nearly all in song by four women: Lizzie (Erin Lambertson), older sister Emma Borden (Cora Kendall), neighbor and close friend Alice Russell (Mai Caslowitz), and the Bordens’ maid Bridget “Maggie” Sullivan (Samantha Ringor). Backing them – literally, seen through the slats of the set by Abigail Wagner that suggests both a simple home and cozy barn – are the band of Ginger Stoltz (keyboard and conductor), Ainsley Paton Stoltz (bass), Kirstin Cutler (drums), Joy Caroline Mills (guitar), Sally McSpadden (guitar and keyboard), and Taylor White (cello and percussion). Direction is by local actor and teaching artist Devan Mathias with musical direction by Ben Rose (who coincidentally has worked at the actual Lizzie Borden House, now a B&B).

Act 1 brings into focus the conditions the Borden sisters were likely living in, and potential motives for what is to come. The tensions weigh on Lizzie and Emma, while a longing grows in Alice; meanwhile, with a dollar from the girls in hand, Maggie is quick to go downtown for the afternoon so she can say she didn’t see a thing someone might be doing.

In Act 2, there is quite a mess – one song is titled, “What the F*** Now, Lizzie?!” – and loosely period costumes give way for something more turn of the Millenium (all designed by Allison Jones) as events take a more modern procedural, crime-of-the-century feel. The number in which Lizzie and Emma make their Kardashian-esque public plea is priceless.

Throughout it all, these ladies rock their hearts out. There are also touching, tender moments, including a song between Lizzie and Alice that recurs in each act, giving two meanings to “Will you lie?” Overall, a bravura performance.

This show brings more of a different perspective to the Borden case and legend than giving any new facts. Events portrayed in any medium are always conjecture and subject to artistic license. Perhaps a good friend “coming to call” could mean more in 1890s New England. Still, the major points follow the story as told elsewhere. This version is very feminist-focused, so one can forgive the downplaying of other problematic aspects such as suspicions cast on local immigrants. On this stage, it’s the grrls’ turn to tell the story – the closest you get to a male presence is Daddy’s body under a sheet.

Four performances remain for “Lizzie,” Thursday through Sunday, Aug. 8-11, at the Phoenix Theatre Cultural Centre, 705 N. Illinois St., Indianapolis. See phoenixtheatre.org for tickets or get info at summerstockstage.com.

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(*“Lizzie” could be compared stylistically to the musical “Six,” but the latter was developed in the U.K. more recently.)